In November Barbara Hall’s term will be up as head of the Ontario Human Rights Commission. But it looks like she’s not going gentle into the good night.

In case you needed any more evidence that the OHRC has worn out its welcome, here’s one for you.

While I was appearing on Sun News last week, Brian Lilley tossed a quote up on the screen from Hall. What she was commenting on doesn’t matter, but how she introduced her statement certainly does: “Ontario’s Human Rights Code is, in a sense, Ontario’s highest law.”

Really? Let’s do a little syllogism here: OHRC-related legislation is the highest in the land; Barbara Hall is the head of the OHRC; therefore Barbara Hall is the highest authority in Ontario.

Luckily we went straight to commercial after that line hit the screen, otherwise I wouldn’t have had enough time to pick my jaw up off the floor. It just astounded me that she would preface her commentary with a line that implies “My word is law.”

If you’re not familiar with the history of Canada’s HRCs you might be asking “what’s the big deal?” Well the big deal is that human rights commissions – and their related tribunals – aren’t about bringing war criminals to justice, or exclusively concerned with people who were fired merely because of their skin colour (which is a far more legitimate pursuit more in line with the mandate on which the OHRC was founded decades ago).

No. Their high profile cases are more often about how someone was offended by a comedian, or not liking something a columnist wrote.

They almost saved the world by stamping out that trio of supervillains Mark Steyn, Ezra Levant and Barbara Amiel. Apparently their wordsmith skills are so mighty that, when they wrote columns (or published cartoons, in Ezra’s case) implying they weren’t head over heels in love with Islam, a court was actually willing to hear a case amounting to the fact people didn’t like their opinions.

The rumour mill has it that former Canadian Jewish Congress leader and Ontario Liberal candidate Bernie Farber is a contender to replace Hall. True or false, it’s worth contemplating. Farber is something of an expert on human rights and hate crime matters. He also seems to be auditioning for the part via his Huffington Post blog, where he is billed as a “Human Rights Advocate”.

Here’s the opening of his May 28 column: “I never really liked the word “tolerance.” It suggests the bare minimum. Simply tolerating each other is far from accepting or, better yet, celebrating each other. In the end “tolerance” is not much of a value statement.”

While later in the column, Farber makes it clear that he’s not suggesting any legislation to enforce “celebrating each other”, this is still an eerie column. To have someone muse on their Facebook page about this is one thing. To hear it from someone who has clout in the shaping of public opinion, and could end up being the head of an agency that thinks it can force us to celebrate each other, is another.

There are many special interest groups who I have zero interest in celebrating. In fact – get ready to call the cops on this one – in the company of friends I even speak poorly of some. And I suspect there are others who do the same about me. That’s the great thing about a free society though, the government doesn’t tell you who you must like.

So-called small government proponents like Tim Hudak and Randy Hillier have already cooled off declawing the Ontario commission and tribunal. But that shouldn’t stop regular people tired of being told by the government which interest groups to “celebrate” from speaking up. Hall’s retirement is the perfect occasion to revive the conversation.

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